


Night train

by Builder



Series: Powers/No Powers Choose-Your-Own-Adventure [33]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Awesome Laura Barton, Depression, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Sickfic, Vomiting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-31
Updated: 2020-05-31
Packaged: 2021-03-03 05:22:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 827
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24479422
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Builder/pseuds/Builder
Summary: Bucky isn’t sure what wakes him; all he knows is that he can’t breathe.  Perhaps it’s the sudden lack of oxygen that spurs him into wakefulness, or maybe he’s been in that sorry state all along.“James?” Laura’s soft voice asks, her hand gripping his stump shoulder with surprising strength wrapped in a mother’s gentle touch.  “Open your eyes.”
Series: Powers/No Powers Choose-Your-Own-Adventure [33]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/760377
Comments: 2
Kudos: 17





	Night train

**Author's Note:**

> Find me on tumblr @builder051

Bucky isn’t sure what wakes him; all he knows is that he can’t breathe. Perhaps it’s the sudden lack of oxygen that spurs him into wakefulness, or maybe he’s been in that sorry state all along.

“James?” Laura’s soft voice asks, her hand gripping his stump shoulder with surprising strength wrapped in a mother’s gentle touch. “Open your eyes.”

He drags his knees toward his chest, dragging bedclothes into an uneven half-circle of creases around his waist. Bucky chokes, gasping for breath, and thick fluid flows up his throat, uncontrolled by the walls of his esophagus. He watches it spill over his lower lip and onto the pillowcase before he begins to gag with any force, and by the time he does that, the tears have begun to roll as well.

“It’s alright, James.” Laura holds his limp body, sliding her flannel robe-clad knees behind his back to hold him up as she moves, sinking into the mattress springs before Bucky gets his bearings again and orients himself against her. She slips an arm over top of him and reaches up to unclench his tight jaw before laying her soft cheek on his shoulder blade, ignoring the sweat-soaked t-shirt making a burning barrier between them.

Bile pours out of Bucky’s mouth again, all over his chin and Laura’s hand. He sputters and tries to shake away the fingers that wipe his lips and smooth his hair, pulling bits of undigested something out of the untrimmed stubble beneath his nose. 

“Stop,” she whispers, palming his back. Laura catches him on an inhale, his spine at its crest, and pushes gently as he deflates, his ribs closing and, god willing, nary opening again. 

“Trying…”

He wants to stop. He’ll do anything to halt the flashes of gore on the backs of his eyelids, the voices ringing in his ears, the bitterness clinging to his tongue. He’s thrown up all over Clint and Laura’s guest room bed, and now he’s done one worse and thrown up all over Laura herself. Bucky feels his cheeks flush, going darker than the dark room, hotter than his overheated body.

“Stop fighting.” Laura slides the tops of her feet under the soles of James’s, still buried under the sheets, She’s full big spoon to his small one now, petting his cheek, smoothing his hair, cupping his chin in preparation for the next, wet or dry, who knows.

“Can’t–” James breaks off with an abrupt hack, a burst of air brought in from the wrong direction. He sputters, then gags. His chest heaves, and Laura rubs him from behind. 

“Have to,” She says plainly. “If you’re sick, you’re sick. If you want to try to sleep, I’ll help you try to sleep. But this night will pass. And tomorrow morning will come.”

“No=“

“And you will feel differently,” Laura goes on, as if he hadn’t interrupted. She rubs her fingers together, then wipes them, front and back, on the sheets near Bucky’s head.

“I won’t feel b-better–” Bucky sobs until he dry heaves.

“Is that what I said?” Laura asks, sternly, but not unkindly. “Differently. This doesn’t last all the way into tomorrow. Surely you know that.”

“I-I-” Bucky stutters. She’s right and he does know it. The great swell of sick panic swirling inside him will eventually go down. It may well be already on the wane, he isn’t sure. He’s not used to staying awake long enough to find out. Hence the bed despite the hour. He has no idea what time it is, just that he’s been asleep and awake. Probably not even midnight.

Bucky hangs his head, swooping it down so it drops to the end of the pillow. He sighs. “Suppose,”

“Come on.” Laura’s clean hand finds James’s, wadded up somewhere under the reaches of his torso. She unwraps his uncooperative fingers one by one and laces them through hers, then pulls gently upward.

“Where?” Bucky can barely force himself to ask. Panic prickles through his skin. Where is she taking him. Home? Back to Steve? Back to where they’d had their last blowout about…Bucky can’t even remember. It was stupid, he knows that much.

Laura shrugs as she sits him up. “Bathroom? That’d be my preference. Kitchen would be ok, but washing you up in that sink might get kind of awkward…”

“Oh.” Bucky feels himself go hot again, tiny particles of sweat blooming on his face and the back of his neck. “S-sorry.”

“What were you thinking?” Laura’s brow furrows. “That I was kicking you out?”

“Nuh, I–” Bucky turns his head, but his eye and his nose both begin to run, and he knows he’s giving himself away.

“Oh, stop.” Laura hugs him, pulling his head down and ignoring the sticky side of his face that keeps rubbing across her ear and her neat, shiny hair. “Stop. You’re fine. And you’re going to be fine, you hear me?”

Bucky nods once. He doesn’t need to again.


End file.
